Michelle Wie still has drawing power

She’s still a draw. Maybe not as much as during the peak of her visibility a few years ago, but she still attracts a crowd.

At the grandstand adjacent to the 18th green at Ko Olina Golf Club, a boy of about 5 asks his dad, “Where’s Michelle Wie?”

He had some more time to wait, but he did so patiently.

And then, there she was.

A thin 6-footer, Wie has always been an unmistakable presence on the golf course. If it hadn’t already been taken by Ted Williams, she could’ve been called the Splendid Splinter; and for a long time before Wie got the piano off her back she shared Williams’ burden of never winning a championship.

Now she’s even more distinct, with a shock of dyed blond hair springing from the back of her visor.

As she waits to take her approach shot, a gallery about 15 rows across and five-deep settles in around her. Wie, now 28, drew much bigger crowds when she was playing against men or contending at majors as a teenager, and then finally winning one four years ago. But this is still a big crowd for a player tied for 14th at the Lotte Championship.

Her shot lands on the high end of the green and stops there, about 40 feet from the hole. It sets up a dangerous downhill putt; it must have legs, but it also has to have brakes or it will end up in the lake. That lake has cost players in this tournament championships and thousands of dollars.

Wie’s putt is a good one, stopping way short of the water, but on the downhill side of the hole, about 4 feet from it.

That shot deserved the over-reactionary roar that comes on her next one, when she knocks in the relatively easy par putt to complete the round (at 1-under-par 71), and the tournament.

Her four days of competition end with her at 3 under par and tied for 11th, nine shots behind winner Brooke Henderson.

Wie’s annual homecoming wasn’t as successful as in 2014, when she was the queen of the course and won the Lotte with a solid and often spectacular 14 under.

Her first pro victory on American soil — she’d previously won in Mexico and Canada — served as a springboard to her first major win two months later at the U.S. Women’s Open. Her other win was last month in Singapore at the HSBC Women’s World Championship.

In 2014 here, she closed with a 67 to hold off the pack. This year, Wie played a final round remarkable only in its un-remarkableness.

“It was a tough day out there today,” she said. “So I’m happy to be under par.”

Her record at this event is a mixed bag. She missed the cut the first year, 2012, and slammed the trunk door two days early again in 2016, when she shot an opening-round 80.

In between, she has been steady and spectacular, with that victory four years ago sandwiched by T-28 in 2013 at 5 under and T-11 in ’15, when she was 3 under.

Last year she tied for 39th, shooting 6 under.

In Saturday’s mugginess and strange winds, Wie bogeyed No. 4, but came back with a birdie on the par-3 No. 8. Then she moved to 1 under with another birdie on No. 11.

The rest of the back nine was a steady stream of pars, some of them difficult due to the conditions.

“I wish I made more of a run for it,” she said. “But I’m happy with the way I played today.”

And judging by those cheers for her par at 18, so were her fans.